Italian PM Berlusconi goes back on trial on corruption charg

Thanks for the info, Walter; I hadn't see this before.

Let me add here this quote from today's New York Times, on another matter that affects Berlusconi's local election efforts:

Killing of Thief Stirs Debate in Italy on the Limits of Self-Defense
By JASON HOROWITZ

ROME, April 24 ?- The case of two Milan jewelers who chased, shot and killed a thief after he smashed their storefront with a sledgehammer has touched off a national debate about where self-defense ends and a new crime begins.

Prosecutors are weighing murder charges against the jewelers, and the issue of their culpability has struck a social and political nerve here, leading thousands of demonstrators to march under banners reading, "We're with those who defend themselves," and prompting politicians to debate the issue of whether Italian justice is too soft on crime and too hard on its victims.

In a poll released Friday by the weekly newsmagazine Panorama, more than 70 percent of those who responded said current law was unfairly balanced against those trying to protect themselves.

Some of the harshest criticism has come from the country's justice minister, Roberto Castelli, who said the penal code was "unbalanced in favor of the criminal to the detriment of honest people."

The issue has surfaced at a delicate time for Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who was swept into office in 2001 in part on a campaign promise to crack down on crime. He faces local elections in June that will test his popularity.

The pointed guns now featured on magazine covers, the television talk shows discussing the Milan case and the subsequent killing of a tobacco vendor in Rome in a robbery ?- as well as studies showing a 10 percent increase in all reported crime in 2003 ?- run contrary to the crime-fighting image he is seeking to project on his election posters.

Mr. Berlusconi's political adversaries are already taking him to task for not keeping his promise, but some of the most vocal critics come from within his own governing coalition.

"Crime is high, and the punishment is too harsh for those who react against it," said Alessandro Ce', a member of the lower House of Parliament from the conservative Northern League, which is no stranger to stirring trouble in Mr. Berlusconi's government.

This week, the Northern League, to which Mr. Castelli also belongs, presented a proposal in Parliament that would severely reduce the legal consequences under existing law for people who are prosecuted for using what is considered excessive force to defend themselves.

Under the proposal, self-defense would be expanded to include the use of firearms in protecting private property in one's home or place of business. Agitation, fear or panic would also become acceptable excuses for shooting an intruder, even if he was fleeing.

Although existing law condones extreme forms of self-defense, the rule of thumb is that the defensive act must be in correct proportion to the crime.

"If someone breaks into your home or store, how do you judge, in five seconds, in the dark of night, what the correct proportion is?" Mr. Ce' asked. "The presumption of innocence should go to the good citizen."

Some political analysts and legal experts have accused the Northern League of trying to exploit voters' fears about rising crime to promote their anti-immigration platform for the June elections. The thief in the Milan case was an illegal immigrant from Montenegro.

"It's a typical electoral issue," said Luigi Arturo Bianchi, a law professor at Bocconi University in Milan. "The Northern League wants to show that it is tough on crime."